Together with yesterday's Galaxy S5 announcement and right after last weekend's Galaxy Gear 2 smartwatch announcement, Samsung yesterday also unveiled the Samsung Gear Fit; the industry's first curved, Super AMOLED wearable device for the active consumer. The Gear Fit offers the unmatched convenience of Samsung Gear technology with the most comprehensive fitness tools available, empowering consumers stay physically active without sacrificing personal style or mobile connectivity. Whether used as a standalone or companion device (for Samsung devices only), the Samsung Gear Fit puts people in charge of their personal and active lives while staying connected so they never miss a moment.

Samsung held a massive event yesterday evening where it announced, at its so called "UNPACK5" event the Samsung Galaxy S5. Still following the design-tradition of the Galaxy S-range, you either love it or hate it, the fifth generation of the Galaxy S was said to be designed for what matters most to consumers. The new Galaxy S5 offers consumers a refined experience with innovation of essential features for day-to-day use. The Galaxy S5 combines an advanced camera, fast LTE network connectivity, dedicated fitness tools and enhanced device protection features as consumers stay fit and connected in style. Capturing and saving precious memories is one of the most important smartphone features today.

Remember SETI@home, a project launched back in 1999 which is an Internet-based public volunteer computing project employing the BOINC software platform, hosted by the Space Sciences Laboratory, at the University of California, Berkeley? Well, HTC announced today that it will do something similar. At its Mobile World Congress press conference, HTC unveiled "HTC Power To Give", a mobile-based volunteer computing project to empower smartphone owners to help answer some of the world's biggest questions. The initiative aims to create a supercomputer by harnessing the collective processing power of Android smartphones. Currently in beta, HTC Power To Give aims to galvanize smartphone owners to unlock their unused processing power in order to help answer some of society's biggest questions.

At today's Mobile World Congress press conference, HTC unveiled the first model in its ambitious 2014 mid-range portfolio of smartphones. The HTC Desire 816 distils elements of the internationally-acclaimed design DNA of HTC's flagship HTC One family, with a vibrant, modern color palate and quality materials that give the HTC Desire range its own familiar, yet distinctive flavor. Demonstrating HTC's obsessive focus on incredible design, both inside and out, the HTC Desire 816 packs an advanced feature set that makes it one of the best value smartphones ever introduced by HTC. The first edition of the new-look HTC Desire family comes fully loaded with HTC's iconic dual-frontal speakers and HTC BoomSound for incredible audio quality.

Not announced at today's HTC Mobile World Congress press conference in Barcelona, HTC also unveiled the HTC Desire 610; a compact Android smartphone which comes packed with a host of features for an incredible mobile audio and visual experience, including a stunning 4.7" screen, HTC Sense, HTC BlinkFeed and HTC's industry leading sound property - HTC BoomSound. The HTC Desire 610 is powered by a quad core processor and 4G LTE connectivity. The allround multimedia experience is completed with advanced photo editing capabilities and automatic highlight videos that will enable to share and show off photos and videos in amazing quality.

As expected and as I wrote earlier, Nokia today announced at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona the Android AOSP-base X-series; which includes the Nokia X, Nokia X+ and Nokia XL and which run Android apps, Microsoft services and signature Nokia experiences. The Nokia X, Nokia X+ and Nokia XL are priced to capture the fast-growing affordable smartphone market; filling the gap between the Lumia Windows Phones and Asha S40 phones; and provide an on-ramp to Microsoft services like Skype, OneDrive and outlook.com. The Nokia X family features Nokia's renowned handset quality and design, with a fresh, tile-based user interface inspired by our Lumia family. All devices come with Fastlane, a screen which lets people switch between their favorite apps more smoothly.

Following the first Samsung Gear and right ahead of tomorrow's starting Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Samsung today announced the Samsung Gear 2 and Samsung Gear 2 Neo smartwatches, which are said to be designed to take the freedom, convenience and style of wearable technology to the next level. The Gear 2 and Gear 2 Neo offer consumers enhanced connectivity and a completely integrated approach for the most personal wearable experience. Samsung said it achieved a significant improvement as a leading smart wearable provider with Gear 2 and Gear 2 Neo. Both devices offer a lightweight design with premium finishes that reflect modern trends. A Camera is equipped to a main body instead to strap, making the Samsung Gear 2 a sleek and sharp smart companion.

I'm quite sure you already know InstaWeather, at least you should have seen it if you are on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram or Google+. It's the best selling app which allows you to spice-up your photos with current weather conditions and forecasts; showing your friends and followers how beautiful or ugly the weather is at your current location. Now, byss mobile has released an update for Android and iOS which adds a new feature: Video mode. This allows you to use your videos instead of your photos, to spice them up with video conditions of your current condition. InstaWeather Pro video features all the weather overlays it supports for photos, making your memories even more alive.

We already knew that Microsoft is working on its Windows Phone 8.1 upgrade but do you also wonder how it will look? Wonder no more because ahead of the official release, a video walk-through of the Windows Phone 8.1 SDK just hit YouTube. While the SDK is yet missing some important features and highlights, like the new Notification Center, the video shows the new soft-buttons implementation, the new volume settings and more. Other Windows Phone 8.1 features include the ability to move apps to memory card, messaging app choices, VPN support and the option to close most recently used apps by swiping the card, very similar as Palm did it with webOS.

In the recent weeks and months, we heard many rumors that Nokia worked on an Android-based smartphone which was code-named "Normandy" and after sources said that this project was nixed after Microsoft announced the take-over of Nokia, The Wall Street Journal said yesterday that the Nokia Asha X, as it is called now, will be definitely unveiled during this month's Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. This rose some concerns if it makes sense for both - Microsoft and Nokia - and I say yes, it makes a lot of sense. If you see the operating system less emotional, it's just a vehicle. In the early smartphone days, Windows Mobile was a vehicle for Microsoft to sell its business proposition to corporate users. And today, the mobile OS is a vehicle to sell apps, and even more important, services to consumers and prosumers.

Following the earlier photoview of the Fairphone FP1, the past weeks I spent a good amount of time with this kind of exotic smartphone which is a so called "social project" by Fairphone. Being an Android smartphone first, the FP1 is aimed to be a smartphone designed and produced with minimal harm to people and environment. Following its successful crowdfunding campaign back in May last year, the first 25,000 Fairphones were shipped December. The said main motivation for developing the Fairphone was "to develop a mobile device" which "does't contain conflict minerals and has fair labor conditions for the workforce along the supply chain". Therefore is the phone body itself, as well as the battery, sporting information where the phone was assembled. This is part of the transparency Fairphone wants to provide its customers.

That's kind of an interesting news for Microsoft users. After its early investment in Facebook, The Wall Street Journal reported yesterday that Microsoft is investing into Foursquare which helps the New York-based company to turn its location-based service into a sustainable business. According the the WSJ report, Microsoft has (already) invested US$ 15 million and has also agreed to a strategic partnership, Chief Executive Dennis Crowley said in an interview. However, the most important part of this investment is the multi-year contract, Microsoft has signed with Foursquare which allows Microsoft to use Foursquare data in services such as Windows Phone and the company's search engine.

Right ahead of this month's Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, it seems that the first real photo of the so called HTC One 2, code-named HTC M8, made its way to the web and it seems to confirm earlier rumors and leaks. It indeed looks like HTC is continuing with its aluminum unibody design, which made the original HTC One to one of the best looking Android smartphones so far but it also seems to confirm that the HTC M8 will indeed come with a kind of dual-camera. The purpose of this dual-camera design is still totally unclear but I wouldn't expect that HTC is going to reinvent the 3D photography because that's dead, nobody cares about 3D anymore. More likely is a kind of second UltraPixel sensor for low-light conditions.

With only a couple of days left until the 22nd Olympic Winter Games start in Sochi, it might be the perfect time to load the related apps to your smartphone. While Samsung is an official sponsor of Sochi 2014 and has therefore recently released its WOW (Wireless Olympic Works) app for Android, Windows Phone users aren't left out in the cold because the Sochi 2014 Organizing Committee has just released the Sochi 2014 Guide and Sochi 2014 Results. The Sochi 2014 Mobile Guide to the Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games in Sochi allows to stay up to date, to know the accurate schedule of competitions and other events and to navigate in Sochi and at sports venues with the interactive map. Sochi 2014 Guide is said to be the encyclopedia of the Games!

Microsoft just announced that its Board of Directors has appointed Satya Nadella as the company's new Chief Executive Officer and member of the Board of Directors effective immediately. Nadella previously held the position of Executive Vice President of Microsoft's Cloud and Enterprise group. Since joining the company in 1992, Nadella has spearheaded major strategy and technical shifts across the company's portfolio of products and services, most notably the company's move to the cloud and the development of one of the largest cloud infrastructures in the world supporting Bing, Xbox, Office and other services. During his tenure overseeing Microsoft's Server and Tools Business, the division outperformed the market and took share from competitors.

There were a couple of information floating around the past weeks that Samsung might not show or announce its next Android hero smartphone, the Samsung Galaxy S5, in Barcelona, during this month's Mobile World Congress. Other sources have spoken from dedicated events in the UK or the US. I've saved you and me from all these rumors because a rumor is just a rumor and in this case they weren't even good one. Nevertheless, this morning Samsung sent out an invitation for its "UNPACKED5" event in Barcelona; and on top it also made the event public on Twitter. Following the previous Unpacked events, we can expect something great and the number 5 might indicate that Samsung will indeed unveil the Galaxy S5.

It took Google a little bit longer to open its wallet garden but it finally happened. As announced today on the Google Developers Blog, starting today, the Google Cast SDK is available for developing and publishing Google Cast-ready apps. This means that Google Chromecast users can expect soon many more apps which will allow to stream from an Android or iOS device to the big screen living room TV. As Google said, the Google Cast SDK is simple to integrate because there's no need to write a new app; but it allows to just incorporate the SDK into existing mobile and and even web apps to bring the content to the TV. The SDK comes with many options for displaying content on Chromecast.

As Pebbleannounced on Friday via Twitter and confirmed again this morning, the smartwatch pioneer will launch today its long awaited appstore. Going live today at 10am PT, iOS users will get the update first while Android users have to wait a little bit longer. Nevertheless, Pebble also said it will make a Beta APK available to developers on Monday as well. Until now, Pebble users had to discover and download apps and watchfaces through several awesome third party resources like MyPebbleFaces. The Pebble appstore changes all this by providing a simple one-stop-shopping solution to discover, manage and install apps and watchfaces. The appstore features separate areas for apps and watchfaces, with six app categories.